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CotUS House Rules
Category:CotUS __TOC__ =The House Rules= There are a number of house rules in effect for the Chosen of the Unconquered Sun campaign. Please read this page thoroughly. Rules Clarifications The Dawn Caste Anima Banner *The Dawn Caste Anima Banner now applies a bonus to defense values equal to the Dawn's Essence score. Non-heroic mortals and all lesser creatures flee without a save unless rallied by at least a heroic mortal leading them. Creatures of Darkness are never immune to the fearsome vissige of the Bronze Tigers, even those which are fearless or mindless. The Eclipse Caste Anima Banner *The Eclipse Caste Anima Power to enforce an oath works by intent, not by strict wording. It will not tolerate deviousness or unrighteousness, nor will it tolerate attempts to lawyer one's way around the wording of the oath. **Most especially it will not tolerate attempts to use it as a ruse to get into a position to attack. If invoked as part of negotiations or parlay as being insurance against harm, unless specifically outlaid otherwise, the respective parties are expected to withdraw to whatever fortifications, preperations, or positions they held before negotiations were initiated (which includes the travel time nessessary to reach the other party) before hostilities may be resumed. **This may be as short as two duelists retreating to opposite sides of a room or dueling ring to take up arms against one another again, or as far as an entire war-band, army or navy removing themselves back to their own faction's holdings. ***To clarify further, at no point may any party resume hostilities by saying "that's that," and attempting to turn and attack before the other party may prepare themselves to ward off the attack. If resuming the original position is impossible, the withdrawing party or parties must remove themselves to an aproximately equavilent distance and level of awareness - if the positions of armies shifted between the negotiation foray and the return, the negotiator and companions (if any) must withdraw to their own army, for example. *Oathes sworn by duly-authorized representatives of a leader, as part of that representative's duties, are considered binding on the leader (and by consequence, all men under his command) unless the leader's player would have rejected the deal, in which case all parties are instantly aware of the failure of the oath. Oathes sworn by a leader are automatically binding on all under his command. For example, the first mate of a vessel may swear in the Captain's stead, a sceneshal may swear for his liege, a Corporal may swear for his Sergeant and the Sergeant's unit, a General may swear for his army, a King for his Kingdom, and a Captain for his ship and all it's officers and crew. **All parties so bound are aware of this fact, but only individual oathbreakers - which includes those who were 'just following orders' to break their oathes and those who break oathes without following orders as well as those who order others to break their oathes, but does not include those above the oathbreaker who were not complicit in his plan to break his oath, nor those below him who do not participate in the oathbreaking - suffer the effects of the oathbreaking. **If one person breaks the oath, it frees the other side from the oath inasmuch as they may act freely (and with as much prejudice as they desire) against the oathbreakers, but it does not free other parties from their oath, nor does it free the aggreived party to act against other oath-takers who have not broken their oathes. *Oathes' intent are ultimately decided upon by the player of the power-invoking Eclipse. All parties of the oath are made aware of the intent the Eclipse decides upon at swearing time, and have the opportunity to reject any oath they do not wish to be party to. **An oath's mutual understanding cannot be violated by any party. If one party understands a concept (such as parlay) to mean one thing and the others understand it to mean another, all parties must be made aware of this fact at swear time. If all parties are not and conflict-of-intent erupts after-the-fact, the conflict will always be decided in favor of those who stand to lose the most. *Eclipse-sworn oaths are immute and inviolate, enforced by Heaven. No after-the-fact attempt may successfully twist or distort the mutual understanding of the oath by any means, nor may free any or all Oathsworn except by mutual agreement of all involved parties. This is considered a permanent Perfect Defense against such attempts, which automatically fail, all of the time. Rules Additions Charging in Combat A "Charge" is now a defined action - a specific Flurry of Dash and Attack, a character advances rapidly on an enemy (who must be at least two yards away) and smites them mightily with one strong blow. This action has the following characteristics: *An enemy who is undertaking the Guard action or the Aim action (focused on you) may reflexively abort their action and gain a free counterattack upon you. This is "setting against a Charge" as far as weapons such as spears, tridents and lances are concerned. **As an exception to normal counterattack rules, only enemies armed with Reach weapons resolve their attack simultainously with you. Victims of a Charge who are without Reach weapons and unable to stunt a simultainously counterattack resolve their attack on you after your on them. *The Attack roll you make on the victim is not diminished because you have Flurried. *If you are on foot, you add one dot of Strength to the effective Strength of your attack. If you are mounted, you use the Mount's strength plus one-half of your own, or your own plus one half of the Mount's strength, whichever is higher. "Lance" type weapons *All weapons with the "L" tag may use their superior damage values when charging or when set against a charge. *All weapons with the "L" tag gain the Piercing quality when resolving a Charge attack while mounted. Pistols and Multi-Barreled Weapons Let it be known that some ranged weapons, of pistol-type mainly, but also of two-hander types that fire more than one projectile along the same line at the same time (such as double-barreled rifles, two-channel crossbows, etcetera,) have had the following changes made to them. *When being dual-wielded, wielding a weapon with more than one barrel, etcetera, all weapons may be fired at the same time in the same attack at the same target. **When doing so, resolve all the attacks as a single attack with seperate attack and damage rolls. This barrage of fire suffers no multiple-action penalty, though the character which initiated the attack does suffer penalties to her defense values for using two weapons to attack with later. **This barrage attack may be defended against as though it were one attack - it does not incur Onslaught penalties to the defender's DVs, it may be defended against with a single charm. *All of these rules may be waived entirely if the firer so wishes, simply by triggering each of his weapons, and each multibarreled weapon's barrels, in sequence instead of simultainously. In this case, all normal rules apply. Rules Changes These are changes to the default rules of Exalted. *Channeling Virtues no longer costs any Willpower to invoke. *Regaining Willpower now uses any Virtue upon waking up, not merely Conviction. *Essence-Gathering Temper and Willpower-Enhancing Spirit are now Permanent Charms. Essence-Gathering Temper no longer has an activation cost, while Willpower-Enhancing Spirit's activation cost is reduced to 2. *Form Weapons for a given Martial Art may be used with the Martial Arts skill, provided you have learned the Form Charm of that Form. If you know multiple Martial Arts trees, only the Form Charm you are using may be used to determine Martial Art weapons. (You don't have to activate the Charm, but you must still specify one style to use at a time.) *Adamant Skin Technique may now be used as a Perfect Defense against any attack, even those which are Unexpected. This has been introduced to balance out the fact that it offers no protection against attacks which only require a touch and do not deal direct damage. It is otherwise unchanged. *As regards Jumping in combat: Small obstacles which do not present a significant hazard (such as jumping over a porch railing to the ground which is not far below, hopping up to the top of a dinner table to fence from it, diving over a burning bonfire or vaulting across a punjee-stick-filled pothole) do not require a roll in my game, and do not impose a DV penalty, though they will still be counted as an action in a Flurry using the speed of an attack if you want to attack in the same round you make this motion. Obstacles which do pose a significant hazard (A forty foot deep pit lined with sipkes, a roaring inferno, anyone who might object (violently) to your leaping over them, jumping up to a second-story balcony from the ground) will require a roll, and penalize your DV. *As regards Craft skills: I'm just going to roll Craft (Earth), Craft (Fire), Craft (Wind), Craft (Water) and Craft (Heart) - errr... ;) The usual five elemental craft skills (Fire, Water, Earth, Wood, and Air) into Craft (Elemental). Exotic craft types are unchanged. If you had previously invested in Craft skills, go ahead and recalculate. Artifact Armors All normal (IE, core-book) armors have had their Artifact cost reduced by one. (It's rather stupid that mere Superheavy Artifact Plate costs exactly as much as Celestial Battle Armor.) All armor suits retain their original statistic lines. *'Artifact Breastplate and Chain Shirt (Artifact 1)' Attunement cost of 0 motes. (Mortals may freely wear but not attune.) Attunement cost is 1 to acheive off-material bonus. No Hearthstone slots. *'Artifact Lamellar Armor and Buff Jackets (Artifact 1)' Attunement cost of 2 motes, One Hearthstone slot. *'Artifact Reinforced Breastplate (Artifact 2)' Attunement cost of 3 motes, One Hearthstone slot. *'Artifact Articulated Plate (Artifact 3)' Attunement cost of 4 motes, Two Hearthstone Slots *'Artifact Superheavy Plate (Artifact 4)' Attunement Cost of 6 motes, Three Hearthstone Slots. Table Rules Rules to abide as a general principle of playing in the CotUS campaign. *Characters are members of the Solar Exalted. No exceptions. *Characters may under no circumstances take a Virtue Flaw, Charm, Style, or anything else which might, even in unlikely circumstances, result in them out-of-controllably attacking other players' characters. The ability to mitigate this with the expenditure of any character resources (including points of temporary Willpower) is not an acceptable argument for taking such a dubious 'feature'. *Characters must be willing and able to take life. The willingness to do so need not be callous - in fact it should not be - but if no alternative exists, they must be willing to do so if nessessary. They should be proficient enough in some form of combat to defeat two Elite Soldiers/Raiders by themselves, without resorting to obvious Charm use. (Although being able to do so without resorting to any Essence use would be better.) **Characters should also possess at least one means by which they may get past those same two Elite Soldiers/Raiders without resorting to violence or intimidation at all - stealth, guile, or whatever, but again, the restriction is no obvious Charm use. *No Empire-Building characters. I am not a silled enough storyteller to deal with player-controlled empires/armies/whatever. This is not limited to merely empires of people, either - no automata armies, you Krazy Krafting Twilights. *Characters must be compatable with each other. They have to live together, work together, fight together, play together, risk death together, and (hopefully) achieve victory together. No character should be so self-absorbed in his own problems, desires, or motivations, that he cannot take time off from them to aid a circlemate with his own problems/desires/motivations. *Characters which grow hostile to one another must have that hostility dealt with, one way or another - if nothing else, the most antagonistic character will be ejected from the game, and if nessessary, the player as well. Please do not let it come to such measures; they suck just as much for the ST and other players as they do for the ejected player. Chargen Rules Changes to default character generation which will affect how your characters are made. *The game starts in Grid S-7 of the Exalted Big Map (you might want to save that.) You can be a local, you can be a far-traveller, you can be Exalted recently and ran to the area, you can have a few years under your belt and have been drawn by divine providence/whatever. Just have a reason (good or otherwise) to be there at the start of the game. *Characters undergo character generation as normal, and then recieve a sum of XP equal to 1/2 that of the highest-XP character in the group, plus 16. *Please take note of my rules as regards the individual Backgrounds: ** Allies are possible, but iffy. You'll need a damn good reason, and each will require being 'sold' to the ST - the default is no until told otherwise. Allies are Storyteller characters, not extensions of your own character. You may choose ones which travel with you, but they will require a damn good reason. **Artifacts are fine and dandy, but custom artifacts will have to be run past me BEFORE the game starts. I don't want to be blindsided by anything. I will generally say yes, but if I say no, please respect that. **Backing is a no-no. I don't feel comfortable dealing with it. **Contacts are acceptable, but you must understand you may not be able to access them for a long while. **Cult is almost certainly a no-no, but if you have a good enough reason, I might say yes. **Familar is acceptable. **Influence is strongly discouraged. As starting Anathema, you probably don't want to be well known. **Manse is fine. It can be a far off location, nearby, or even one you resonate with and recieve inside the starting area. **Mentor is okay, though it will need a fairly good justification. Bear in mind you'll be getting one mentor figure for free, but you may have external mentors if you really wish. You may not get access to them for some time. Mentors taken by Eclipse caste characters may only be Solar Exalts, Terrestrial Exalts, or Mortals. They may not know any of the Immaculate styles. You may not begin play with non-Solar Charms. **Resources are fine and dandy. Backgrounds for XP *Acquiring a Background in play now now carries an experience point cost of three points per dot. This cost does not have to be paid in full up-front, but a character must pay as soon as they are capable. Half of all XP gains will be devoted to servicing XP debt until the debt is paid off. (Other forms of debt may be negotible.) **Backgrounds lost in play for reasons other than grossly stupid activities are immediately refundable for XP. An example of gross stupidity would be pissing off an ally and losing them as an ally. *Crafting items may simply cost XP, or you may choose instead to use exotic components. Artifacts or Manses or whatever crafted with XP may simply 'happen,' (failed rolls risk nothing,) or you may choose to go on quests to find exotic components. These are more time consuming, but will generally provide XP in their own right as well as an artifact. *Owing to the temporary nature of Resources, as well as the desire to not be punished for a job well done, any Resources gained incidentally in the course of doing something, or as a result thereof, such as the swag from selling the loot you get from kicking a Wyld Hunt's ass, or the reward given by a pontiff grateful to have his daughter back, are not charged as experience point costs. Gaining Resources from doing downtime things which are not the main focus of the game, such as playing the stock market or something, however, is an XP-based gain. *XP costs may be pooled for shared resources - such as a hypothetical airship belonging to the whole circle. You may also pool XP for item creation, such as the intended owner donating all of the XP to the crafter to make it. (This XP may also be shared amongst more than one, but there's no refunds if you decide later you regret being so generous.) *Any artifact or other BG which is inherantly one-shot, such as a Soulbreaker Orb, is very, very non-refundable. If it comes up as part of a quest or something, you won't be charged, but if you want one as insurance, it will be. Character Advice *It might be wise to have at least one means of forcibly subduing at least mortal opponents without killing them. A club would do, certainly. *You might want to talk with other players about making your characters aquaintances or whatever. It's by no means nessessary, though. *Players will need to communicate with one another. I won't enforce this, simply so that I may laugh my ass off while hilariously mistranslating foreign languages, but you probably should work this out amongst yourselves. Good candidates are Old Realm and Rivertongue, but you can all speak Seatongue if you want, I don't care. *You ought to know Old Realm, it could be important... I have that feeling. *If you plan to have artifacts, it might be a good idea to ensure that they can be concealed, passed off as gaudy jewelry or whatever, or may be stored Elsewhere. You can get away with them for awhile, but moving into an area dominated by the Immaculate Faith while wearing the fact that you're Anathema openly might cause things to go not-smooth. *Investing in a dot or two of Ride wouldn't go amiss. You won't need it, but it might make things smoother down the road. You don't need to bother buying a riding animal unless it's integral to your character or exceptional in some way, however. The Chosen of the Sun will have little trouble acquiring horses or other means of transport. *At least one of you ought to invest in War. You can get by without it, but it would probably cause things to go smoother if someone was trained in War. *Reading Telly Tropes Wiki and knowing much of it will help. Exalted is dominated by the Rule of Cool, and something being a TVTrope is generally justification enough for it. (Warning: TVTropes has been linked side effects, such as: Ruining your life, Author Appeal, Gorn, Brontophobia, Brontosaurophobia, and Involuntary Shapeshifting. TV Tropes is not for children under 12, women who are nursing or pregnant, or people with gall bladders. Prolonged use may result in over-extending humourous situations to the point where they are no longer amusing.)